A little functionality request from @antoniolocandro on twitter:
Ask and ye might receive. Let’s build a function that will take your input geography, how far you want to buffer (in local coordinates) number of segments you want in a quarter, and what local coordinate system you want to use for your buffer as an EPSG code.
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION zz_buffer(g1 geography, radius_of_buffer float, num_seg_quarter_circle integer, local_coord integer) RETURNS geometry AS $BODY$ WITH transformed AS ( SELECT ST_Transform(g1::geometry, local_coord) AS geom ), buffered AS ( SELECT ST_Buffer(geom, radius_of_buffer, num_seg_quarter_circle) AS geom FROM transformed ), transformed_4326 AS ( SELECT ST_Transform(geom, 4326) AS geom FROM buffered ) SELECT * FROM transformed_4326 $BODY$ LANGUAGE sql VOLATILE COST 100;
Now let’s use this:
SELECT 0 AS id, zz_buffer(ST_GeomFromText ('POINT(-81 41)', 4326) , 15000, 2, 3734)
Now, we can test which level of smoothness we like best:
SELECT 0 AS id, zz_buffer(ST_GeomFromText ('POINT(-81 41)', 4326) , 15000, generate_series, 3734)
FROM generate_series(1,50)
Smathermather's Weblog 
Due to the fact that ::geography is internaly finding the best fitting projection its would be way easier to use just
ST_Buffer(geom::geography, radius_of_buffer, num_seg_quarter_circle)::geometry
That doesn’t work because there is no ST_Buffer(geography, radius_of_buffer, num_seg_quarter_circle).
”
ERROR: function st_buffer(geography, double precision, integer) does not exist
LINE 4: SELECT ST_Buffer(geog, 5000.0::float, 1)::geometry FROM poin…
^
HINT: No function matches the given name and argument types. You might need to add explicit type casts.
”
You are correct however that this would be better to implement at a lower level so that geography supports num_seg_quarter_circle _because_ such a function could decide the best coordinate system for the user.
Don’t forget _ST_BestSRID. This function tells you the best SRID for a geometry, allowing you to re-implement ST_Buffer(geography, N) with geometries
Ah! I will rewrite this tonight.